STOP THE BOMBS! CEASEFIRE NOW! (actionnetwork.org)
Meet The Companies Profiting from Israel’s War on Gaza
Who Are You?
Someone, who may be a friend, tells me she will not be a “Militant Humanist” that crafts words to help destroy the enemies of the world. Who is this “enemy” she asks, and wants to know how someone could be a militant and a humanist at the same time; says even if she could use her writing the way I ask, being aggressive is against her nature; says what is happening in Gaza is too much for her to consume in large doses, as she is strongly in touch with her own suffering and the suffering of others. She says, thinking of the evolution of humanity and the world’s collective consciousness, that her way to help is to accept things the way they are and teach meditation, self-care, and self-improvement within her own environment and community. I want to disturb her. Sent her my latest poem. “Thank you for sharing,” she replies.
Militant Humanist Manifesto (Early Draft)
The murders in Gaza are spreading from the river to the sea and you feel helpless. Author
poems, draft stories, write essays, get published, some people read what you write. Still feel
lame, lame until lame does not work as an idea. Love works as an idea; hate works as an idea.
You talk to people, not knowing exactly why, talk to family, to strangers, few want to talk; find
most who say they care do not care enough to baby step beyond talking. You feel impotent.
You dream of dead babies under rubble, see how a woman captured or raped on October 7th
would like to wear an IDF uniform to torture or blindly shoot as many Palestinians as possible.
You, filling with hatred, your love being murdered as you breathe, wish to kill those white men
giving deranged orders for the genocide of a decimated people not in self-defense but for land.
You, like a warrior, like an alchemist, like a wizard, like a seeker of holy vengeance, use words,
see them as ancient daggers and honey atop sacred earth blessed by more than one God.
*Highly Suggested Reading List*
https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781538145098/The-Militant-Intellect-Critical-Theorys-Conceptual-Personae
The Revolutionary Humanism of Franz Fanon by Peter Hudis, Jacobin, 12.26.2020
Decolonizing Therapy: Oppression, Trauma, and Politicizing your Practice, Jennifer Mullan
The Dark Side of Love: The Positive Role of Negative Feelings, Jane Goldberg
Paradise Lost by John Milton, Gutenberg Project & Wiliam Blake Illustrations
* Query for Contributor Guidelines*
Netanyahu has devoted his life to binding the fate of all Jews to the furtherance of the Israeli state. This is rank antisemitism: the assumption that to be Jewish is to support Israel’s crimes. To be clear: Anyone who attempts to fasten a 5,000-year-old religion to a 150-year-old colonial project is guilty of antisemitism. They are pushing the idea that my family, merely because of our religion, supports war crimes abroad and the crackdown on critics at home.
Dave Zirin, The Nation, December 5, 2023
https://www.ochaopt.org/content/flash-appeal-occupied-palestinian-territory-2023
Peace,
Andrés